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2018 Ontario Polls

If that poll is accurate, it destroys(at least for this election)any argument that progressives have an obligation to vote Liberal to stop the PC's. It would indicate that the choice now is solely between a PC majority and a PC plurality, and there could not be many ridings in that scenario where voting Liberal will be the vote that stops a PC gain.

I think it is extremely unlikely that a nearly even split between the Libs and NDP will continue from now to the election. At some point one of them will pull ahead consistently for a couple of weeks, then there will be a stampede in that direction. History says it will be the Liberals, but you never know, it could be the NDP. After all, it's pretty hard to demonize Horwath as extreme left.

Being a "change" election there is a very good chance people will move to the NDP to stop the Conservatives. It isn't that Ontario has suddenly become more Conservative. The Liberals are just carrying way too much stink. I wonder if Trudeau will campaign with Wynne.

Getting real old reading about the “stop the conservatives “ vote. I think that was all buried in 2015 and is as much still relevant as Bob Rae for the NDP. From reading a bunch of comments here it sounds like some posters are living in the past. Or want to resurrect some ghosts. Also I never believed that the NDP provincially in Ontario or federally will ever have any real success in the ABC campaigns. After this election I’m hoping the ONDP revisit public auto insurance.

Second poll in a row showing NDP ahead of Liberals who continue to fall from 21% to 19%.

NDP leading in Northern Ontario with 40%

A close second in Toronto with 31% to Cons 36%

Eight in 10 (81%) Ontarians believe it’s time for another provincial party to take over and run the province compared to just two in 10 (19%) who say the Liberal government under Premier Kathleen Wynne has done a good job and deserves to be re-elected ...

The following are the regional results:

Toronto (“416”)

Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario 36%

New Democratic Party 31%

Ontario Liberal Party 22%
Other 11%

Greater Toronto Area (“905”)

Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario 53% New Democratic Party 16%
Ontario Liberal Party 19%
Other 12%

Central Ontario

Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario 52% New Democratic Party 25%
Ontario Liberal Party 17%
Other 6%

Southwestern Ontario

Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario 41% New Democratic Party 25%
Ontario Liberal Party 18%
Other 16%

Eastern Ontario

Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario 43% New Democratic Party 24%
Ontario Liberal Party 21%
Other 13%

First Alberta, then BC, and now in Newfoundland and Labrador and even in Ontario the NDP is showing signs of life. Could it be the millennials are able to cut through the right-wing Liberal and Conservative lies and deceit about inequality and are supporting the NDP, the main progressive political party in Canada?

Do you know how this dart poll would translate into number of seats for the NDP?

There are no seat projections with the poll. With a 20% lead, the Cons would be expected to form a large majority government. However, the NDP would do very well in the North as they have a 13% lead there and would do reasonably well in parts of Toronto as they are only 5% behind the Cons there.

Of course, campaigns, as we have seen in many elections, can dramatically change results. Two things the Cons have going for them now that will change is their leadership race means they are absorbing nearly all the media attention. Second, with four candidates ranging from establishment Con to far right Con, centre-right to far-right voters can project whatever set of values they want on the party. Once a leader is chosen, that will narrow somewhat and possibly cost the Cons some of their lead.

If the NDP can maintain its lead over the Liberals, some voters may also see them as the most viable alternative to a Con government. With Andrea Howrath also still polling as the most popular leader, this is another advantage that could be a major advantage during the election race, as modern campaigns are primarily leader-driven.

Three of the four PC leadership candidates want the vote delayed because many voters have not received their ballots. One of them is Doug Ford. This is raising the prospect of the questioning of the legitimacy of the leadership election. And if Doug Ford loses under these circumstances, based on past experience, he is not likely "to go gentle into that good night."

If the Cons make a mess of the leadership election, it could hurt them in a major way, especially after the Brown sex scandal, the corruption and the phoney membership allegations. People could start wondering how they could run a province if they can't run a party properly.

This is an example where the NDP could be the party you vote for strategically to stop the Conservatives. Where is the bloom in Conservative support coming from? Liberals. So again, if a Liberal says vote Liberal to stop the Conservatives, ask the Liberal why he or she is voting Conservative...

This is an example where the NDP could be the party you vote for strategically to stop the Conservatives. Where is the bloom in Conservative support coming from? Liberals. So again, if a Liberal says vote Liberal to stop the Conservatives, ask the Liberal why he or she is voting Conservative...

CBC Power and Politics reported the rumour that long term establishment PC members received their ballots early while many members still have not received theirs. While Doug Ford, Caroline Mulroney and Tanya Granic Allen all want the voting deadline extended, the establishment candidate, Christine Elliott, who is also the only one with MLA experience does not.

While the Crown Princess of the PCs, Caroline Mulroney, may well be quiet about the voting problem, recognizing that she needs more political experience before taking on the leadership role, it's hard to see Ford or Granic Allen doing so.

Granic Allen's whole campaign is based on the establishment denying social conservatives like herself the right to run as candidates in a number of ridings and the general air of corruption in the party, of which Patrick Brown is only part in her opinion.

Doug Ford is saying there may be 100,000 PC members who have not received their PIN numbers, which are needed to vote. The fact that as of Thursday only 53,000 out of an alleged 190,000 members have voted and the deadline is noon today. The party executive declined to change the date. Doug Ford is not the type to silently walk away for the good of the party.

On Power and Politics, former Conservative minister Stockwell Day said a brouhaha over the selection of the new leader could "snatch defeat from the jaws of victory" in the provincial election.

Today's deadline for voting is now being challenged in court, further adding to the PC leadership election controversy. This could get very ugly.

A Toronto lawyer has filed an application for an injunction to extend the deadline to vote in the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party leadership. Jeffrey Radnoff said the Superior Court of Justice was scheduled to hear his application for an injunction on Friday morning, just hours before voting in the contentious race was scheduled to end. In an email late Thursday Radnoff said that his client, listed on the notice of application as Christopher Arsenault, had not received a personal identification number allowing him to vote. "Clearly, a significant number of members of the party, including the applicant, have been deprived of their right to vote
as guaranteed in the party's constitution," Radnoff wrote.

Lawyer John Nunziata, who is also a former Toronto-area MP, said he approached Radnoff after being contacted by multiple people in the party. Nunziata — who will also be in court on Friday — said the action isn't on behalf of any particular candidate. ...

The move comes after the party announced early Thursday it would not extend registration or voting deadlines any further, rejecting requests from three of the four leadership candidates for a one-week extension. ...

Leadership hopeful Christine Elliott, the only candidate who has not asked for an extension, said she's focusing on getting as many members out to vote before noon Friday as possible. Filing the injunction is "their right to do so," she said, "but for my part I'm doing what's within my control." ...

"The system is working. Are there some problems with it? Yes, of course," said Elliott. But, she added, the party has constitutional reasons why the deadline can't be extended.

Caroline Mulroney, who is also in the running, told CBC News she was initially disappointed that the party did not extend the vote. But she said she's working with the party to get as many people registered as possible.

In a tweet, Mulroney said she had heard of members not receiving their packages and were therefore unable to vote, echoing remarks from candidate Doug Ford, who on Wednesday in a statement claimed he'd met with many "outraged" voters.

A campaign spokesperson said Ford's team learned about the injunction late Thursday, through Twitter, and that Ford is not involved.

In a statement Thursday night, Tanya Granic Allen said she urged the party to take "immediate" measures to delay the leadership vote by a week.

Doug Ford has already started questioning the legitimacy of the PC leadership vote. He's called the process "scandalous" and "ridiculoous". If this becomes the public's perception of the leadership race it could really hurt whoever becomes leader.

Ontario Progressive Conservative leadership candidate Doug Ford says win or lose he'll be asking for a review of the party's online voting system, which he says has robbed tens of thousands of party members of their say.

The former Toronto city councillor made the comments just hours before news broke that an injunction to extend the voting deadline would be heard in court Friday morning.

Ford says they've [party members] told him they can't vote, even though they've received their PIN from the party in the mail.

"They went online and it said someone had used their PIN number," said Ford, who demanded the party extend voting by a week, due to delays in verification numbers being mailed out to members. ...

"Constitution. my backside. It's a bunch of nonsense. They can move this in a heartbeat," he said.

"I've never seen something that disenfranchises more people from a party than this does," Ford said. He believes a week's delay is reasonable. ...

Michael Fenrick, a lawyer and partner at Paliare Roland, says there are options open to Ford to get the review he says he wants — up to and including legal action. He says Ford could look to the party itself for an internal review, but that would need the party executive to agree. "So if there's any appeal or review to the party executive or an appeal panel, that's an option and that's one they'd have to pursue before they could get into court," Fenrick told CBC Toronto. If Ford doesn't get his review he could mount a legal challenge, Fenrick says, but only if these internal options are exhausted.

Andrea Horwath's New Democrats are going to win the Ontario provincial election on June 7.

I know this because I'm from Alberta and we've been through this perfect storm already.

In the early spring of 2015, Alberta's provincial election was looming. Polling suggested Alberta voters were growing tired of the Progressive Conservative Dynasty -- then led by banker and former Conservative MP Jim Prentice.

But since we'd all learned from our mamas that Alberta was "the most conservative province in Canada," and since the PCs had been in power for close to 44 years, change was hard to imagine.

In mid-March, Prentice, his caucus expanded by 10 Wildrose MLAs who had recently defected to his side, was projected to win a 64-seat majority.

Pundits, praying for a horserace, started to predict the even-further-to-the-right Wildrose Party holdouts might make a breakthrough, and, for a spell, Alberta voters seemed to go along with that notion.

Twenty-six days before the election, polling analyst Eric Grenier's usually reliable poll aggregation site cautiously predicted a Wildrose victory with as many as 48 seats. "That makes them the only party in the projection with a likely range surpassing the 44-seat mark needed for a majority government," he wrote.

The New Democrats might form the Opposition, Grenier suggested, with the PCs coming third.

Well, we all know what happened on May 5. Alberta's New Democrats, led by the charismatic and obviously capable Rachel Notley, were picked by voters to lead Alberta into a future no one quite expected.

Voters apparently concluded they'd not only had enough of the Progressive Conservatives, they'd had enough of conservativesaltogether.

Why did this happen? Well, nobody really knows, but it seems likely the Alberta electorate, more sophisticated than they were ever given credit for by all the usual suspects, were righteously sick of the Tories but uninterested in an even more extreme version of the same thing.

Notley was a familiar face in a new role, obviously capable, and genuinely progressive -- as were a great many Albertans, it turned out, just like voters in Ontario.

Some voters may have soon experienced buyer's regret, but they gave Notley a 54-seat majority and history was made, especially since the NDP Caucus had only four members on the day Prentice dropped the writ.

Now it is the spring of 2018 and Ontario is about nine weeks away from its next provincial election. The situation is not exactly the same as it was in Alberta in the spring of 2015, but the similarities are striking.

The government of Liberal Premier Kathleen Wynne has grown long in the tooth, touched by scandal and voter fatigue. She has been in power since 2013. The Ontario Liberal Party has run the province without a break since 2003.

The prevailing narrative of pundits leading into the previous Ontario election, in 2014, was that voters were sick of the Liberals and would pick the PCs.

But Tim Hudak, who had become leader of the PC Opposition in 2009, came out as an anti-union obsessive, determined to turn the province into a Republican right-to-work state. This and other things apparently caused sufficient disquiet among Ontario voters for Wynne to hang on for another term in 2014.

Hudak then quit. After a spell under an interim leader, party members elected Patrick Brown, a federal conservative MP from Barrie, in May 2015.

Now the media says Doug Ford, the similarly bombastic brother of Rob Ford, the never to be forgotten mayor of Toronto who died on March 22 last year.

It is, in other words, an absolute gong show, hard to keep up with, and, probably, everything will change again tomorrow!

The province's voters are doubtless still sick of Wynne's Liberals, but the PC Opposition is leaderless, in a state of open rebellion, and quite obviously incapable of safely operating a hot dog stand, let alone Canada's most populous province.

Oh, and Caroline Mulroney, the daughter of old Basso Profundo himself, is also running for the party's leadership.

For the moment, it is not clear what Ontario voters are going to do.

Political commentator Warren Kinsella, a Liberal, gloomily reported on his blog that the Ontario PCs are still competitive. Mind you, that conclusion was based on polls taken before the latest parade of clown cars headed up Toronto's University Avenue toward the Ontario Legislature, honking their horns as men in fright wigs on tiny motorcycles buzzed around them.

Kinsella certainly knows the Ontario political scene better that I do. He lives there, after all, and I haven't for 30 years.

I have lived in Alberta, though, so here's what I think is going to happen:

Andrea Horwath, the MPP (as Ontario pretentiously calls its MLAs) for Hamilton Centre who has run the NDP caucus at Queen's Park (as Ontario pretentiously calls its Legislature) for nearly a decade without messing up dramatically enough for it to be noticed out here on the Prairies, will canter into power, just as Notley did.

She's a single mom, a responsible job if ever there was one. She's a former Hamilton city councillor. She's been an MPP since 2004. She's run literacy programs for unions. She's made a cause of social housing and injured workers' rights. She was honoured with the Woman of the Year in Public Affairs in 1999 the Hamilton Status of Women Committee. She knows how to act like a grownup.

You get the picture.

Horwath is going to look to a lot of voters like she's got what it takes to be premier. She's by definition not a right-wing loon who's going to act like an ideological bull and smash all the china. (Ontario's been there under Conservative golfer and premier Mike Harris. Nobody wants the T-shirt.)

Horwath is untainted by the scandals associated with the Wynne government. But she ticks most of the other boxes for stuff Ontarians liked about Wynne.

Like Notley, she's a familiar face seeking a new role, obviously capable, and genuinely progressive.

So why not vote for her?

Of course, people closer to the scene are going to have a thousand and one reasons why I'm wrong.

The polls Kinsella noted, for example, show the Liberals and the NDP in a statistical tie, each with lower support than the PCs. But that will change as election day nears and progressive votes shift toward the party most likely to keep dangerous clowns out of power.

We Albertans have already seen this movie and, no matter what the Opposition claims, the ending's still pretty good.

So Andrea Horwath is going to win on June 7, just like Rachel Notley did on May 5, 2015. Remember where you heard it first, Alberta!

Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath called out the Liberal government Friday for inadequate funding of health care services and vowed to establish both a separate ministry for mental health and addictions and a pharmacare system.

Evidently the computerized ballot system borked on them, leading to an unsurprising demand for a manual recount and all the other strife you might imagine. If they get their mojo working then we might hear a result today, but regardless of what it is, I doubt that will be the end of it.

If Ford survives the recount and becomes leader then this will take a new turn. Both the NDP and Liberals will attempt to take the supporters of the other to defeat Ford. The ability to be successful at this will be about the initial momentum and quality of the start of the campaign. I think it would be wrong to presume anything as there are a number of possibilities:

1) Perhaps Ford is capable fo winning. It is difficult to determine the strength of people like this. It is hard to determine how people will feel about the brother of Ford or if Ford can get the "government waste" fanatics to want to elect this guy who will take a wrecking ball to the government.

2) Perhaps the NDP is better positioned with a less unpopular leader and could see Liberals going NDP recognizing that the alternative is worse.

3) Perhaps the Liberals as government and often the presumptive senior option will galvanize some NDP voters and PCs who dislike Ford to support them.

4) Perhaps the comnination of NDP and Liebrals could hold off a PC Majority and then govern together.

I think it would be incorrect to think that there is not a narrative for each of these parties to win outright. Any minority would be a difficult and dangerous one. I think the Liberals would bnever back Ford but a coalition with the NDP would be fragile and politically problematic. I am sure the NDP would insist that win had to go. I am also sure that they would be nervous of such an arrangement especially if they were not the lead party in it.

If Ford survives the recount and becomes leader then this will take a new turn. Both the NDP and Liberals will attempt to take the supporters of the other to defeat Ford. The ability to be successful at this will be about the initial momentum and quality of the start of the campaign. I think it would be wrong to presume anything as there are a number of possibilities:

1) Perhaps Ford is capable fo winning. It is difficult to determine the strength of people like this. It is hard to determine how people will feel about the brother of Ford or if Ford can get the "government waste" fanatics to want to elect this guy who will take a wrecking ball to the government.

2) Perhaps the NDP is better positioned with a less unpopular leader and could see Liberals going NDP recognizing that the alternative is worse.

3) Perhaps the Liberals as government and often the presumptive senior option will galvanize some NDP voters and PCs who dislike Ford to support them.

4) Perhaps the comnination of NDP and Liebrals could hold off a PC Majority and then govern together.

I think it would be incorrect to think that there is not a narrative for each of these parties to win outright. Any minority would be a difficult and dangerous one. I think the Liberals would bnever back Ford but a coalition with the NDP would be fragile and politically problematic. I am sure the NDP would insist that win had to go. I am also sure that they would be nervous of such an arrangement especially if they were not the lead party in it.

The Liberals IMO will attempt to steal the oxygen in the room by putting forward a bold set of new policy proposals in the hopes that the MSM will give them all the attention as the alternative to the Cons.

The NDP needs to be ready to put out proposals that will get media attention right at the start of the election aimed at not only to base voters, but also to alienated low-information voters who might consider voting for Ford just as some Sanders voters had Trump as an alternative rather than Clinton. If Horvath can show a significant lead over Wynne more voters may start moving in her direction to block Ford.

I am not sure how old you are. I remember the campaign well. 1990 was a much longer shot then than an NDP victory now would be.

ETA: right off I will compare the preceeding political history:

The 1990 campaign started with Peterson well in the lead and expecting a new mandate. The Liberals had been in power less than 4 years with a majority (the election was unnecessary) following a short term being propped up by the NDP. Before that there was a PC dynasty that had become tired and lost after a leadership change away from Bill Davis. the Liberals were expected to win and it was a shock to many people that the campaign led to a different result. The Liberals biggest problem was presumed arrogance (I remember cartoons from the time of people talkign policy and Peterson saying "do you want a hot dog?"

The present campaign comes after the Liberals have been unpopular and scandal-ridden for years. According to polls, a majority of voters think it is time for a change. The rot is set in. Many Liberals are themselves upset that Wynne did not step aside and allow renewal. The NDP has the longest standing leader who is far more popular than the Liberal leader and the NDP has polled reasonably close to the Liberals for the last while, at times ahead of them. There is a widespread expectation that the Liberals simply cannot win.

I think it is ridiculous to suggest that the NDP is less likely to win now than they were in 1990. At that time I would have said it was a 20-1 shot. Now it is probably a 4-1 shot. For the Conservatives I would call it better than even. For the Liberals it is maybe 3-1 or 5-1 depending on who you ask (Better or worse a chance than the NDP).

If Ford survives the recount and becomes leader then this will take a new turn. Both the NDP and Liberals will attempt to take the supporters of the other to defeat Ford. The ability to be successful at this will be about the initial momentum and quality of the start of the campaign. I think it would be wrong to presume anything as there are a number of possibilities:

1) Perhaps Ford is capable fo winning. It is difficult to determine the strength of people like this. It is hard to determine how people will feel about the brother of Ford or if Ford can get the "government waste" fanatics to want to elect this guy who will take a wrecking ball to the government.

2) Perhaps the NDP is better positioned with a less unpopular leader and could see Liberals going NDP recognizing that the alternative is worse.

3) Perhaps the Liberals as government and often the presumptive senior option will galvanize some NDP voters and PCs who dislike Ford to support them.

4) Perhaps the comnination of NDP and Liebrals could hold off a PC Majority and then govern together.

I think it would be incorrect to think that there is not a narrative for each of these parties to win outright. Any minority would be a difficult and dangerous one. I think the Liberals would bnever back Ford but a coalition with the NDP would be fragile and politically problematic. I am sure the NDP would insist that win had to go. I am also sure that they would be nervous of such an arrangement especially if they were not the lead party in it.

The Liberals IMO will attempt to steal the oxygen in the room by putting forward a bold set of new policy proposals in the hopes that the MSM will give them all the attention as the alternative to the Cons.

The NDP needs to be ready to put out proposals that will get media attention right at the start of the election aimed at not only to base voters, but also to alienated low-information voters who might consider voting for Ford just as some Sanders voters had Trump as an alternative rather than Clinton. If Horvath can show a significant lead over Wynne more voters may start moving in her direction to block Ford.

Absolutely -- there are two dynamics --

The first would be the reactions to the campaign and policies. By this I mean how proposals are recieved. The NDP has to do better than the Liberals and they have to hope that the Conservatives come out with things that turn off the voters or give them pause.

The second is tha tthe NDP must find enough positive from anywhere to position themselves ahead fo the Liebrals before the small number of strategic voters make presumptions.

The Liberals IMO will attempt to steal the oxygen in the room by putting forward a bold set of new policy proposals in the hopes that the MSM will give them all the attention as the alternative to the Cons.

To be fair, that wouldn't be a Jedi Mind Trick, that would be politics working as it's kind of supposed to, yes? IOW, a party makes some poor choices, they see that's not what the electorate wants, so they make some new choices that are. To me, that's no more odious than a restaurant changing its menu based on what people actually prefer to eat.

Of course a restaurant might go tone deaf and say "we hear that you like kale now, so here's our deep-fried kale fritters". Or they might sell you a kale risotto with no actual kale in it. Or they might say, every single night, "sorry, we're sold out on the kale". Those are all separate issues. But no specific restaurant should be singled out for wanting to follow the kale crowd.

Very interesting turn of luck for the NDP. From just a glancing impression of polls, the pc numbers have settled in a comfortable lead, the ONDP have the forward momentum and the liberals are the only ones in reverse.

All of this in my opinion is a result of the Ontario voters perception of the liberals provincially and perhaps a spill over backlash towards Justin. Because Ontario has a history of maintaining a balance between conservatives/liberal provincial/federal representation, this dynamic shouldn’t be completely ignored. Should also point out that Bob Rae ONDP provincial government fits into this dynamic.

To my disappointment Horwath (right wing NDP) will be around until after 2022 election. If the ONDP form government in the summer of 2018, the only thing that will change my view of Horwath is if she brings in public auto insurance

I think the Liberals would bnever back Ford but a coalition with the NDP would be fragile and politically problematic.

Serious question: Why do you think the Liberals would never back Ford? Is that more credible than them never voting to prop up Harper (or saying they'd be Harper's worst nightmare and then crossing the floor before the House is even convened, say)?

As it has already been suggested, Brown's supporters were really pissed with the PC-Brown brouhaha, so they moved to Ford to put him over the top.

Andrea has her work cut out for her if Ford holds on to the win, as it will be like running against Trump. Hopefully she is already firing out an attack on Twitter today. Let's Rock & Roll here NDPers. There is no time like immediately to get this show on the road!!!

While Doug Ford appeared to have garnered the most points from ridings, Christine Elliott took the popular vote, sources said, putting the two front-runners in a heated battle that could end up in the courts.

Speaking as the in-house Yank here, I can tell you that attack ads on Ford would be as ineffective as Hillary's attack ads on Trump. The way to stop Doug(as is the way to have stopped Trump or to stop him in 2020)is to make a clear case for what your party(in this case the ONDP) will do, how what it will do will help voters and help them in fairly short order, and why what you are proposing will actually be a better idea than Doug's politics of sabotage and chaos.

Any chance the disputed results could cause a split in the PC vote, maybe some sort of "Independent Conservative" candidacies in some ridings just so whoever loses the contest gets payback on the disputed "winner"?

The Liberals IMO will attempt to steal the oxygen in the room by putting forward a bold set of new policy proposals in the hopes that the MSM will give them all the attention as the alternative to the Cons.

Exactly Jerry! While few, if any, among us are fans of the PCs, we have to remember that outside of our own bubble there are people who dislike the Liberals just as much. Why should we assume that these voters can't be reached?

While Doug Ford appeared to have garnered the most points from ridings, Christine Elliott took the popular vote, sources said, putting the two front-runners in a heated battle that could end up in the courts.